11 Year Old Gets Lost in 1/2 Marathon

A youngster ran after his dad at the start of a half-marathon race to give him a bit of support and then kept on running for the entire 13 miles.

Ian Scoggins, 12, is basking in the glory of his achievement but was in hot water at the time as he didn't tell his parents what he was up to.

His mother said: 'He only went to cheer his dad on and run the first bit with him, but then he vanished. 'After 45 minutes he still wasn't back so I started panicking.'

Dad Ian, who finished in 1 hour 45 minutes, said: 'I saw him behind me after about two minutes, then looked again and he'd gone. I assumed he'd gone back. The frantic parents enlisted the help of police on site to search for Ian.

Then all of a sudden he appeared at the finish line all red-faced. 'We asked him where he'd been and he said he'd run the half marathon. We didn't believe him, then people kept coming up and patting him on the back saying how well he'd done.

Ian said: 'My legs are really hurting now. I thought I might get lost on my way back, so I kept running. Then once I'd started I wanted to finish it.'

Sign in Clothing Store in China

You are not supposed to tell customers they are crazy. Go figure.

Someday it will all be worth it

Spelling 101

Bad spelling and grammar is ruining our society. Instead of warning drivers this sign offered them the opportunity to take the plates, setting construction back days and costing taxpayers millions.

Jewish hockey player to play on Sabbath

I had previously posted a story about Benjamin Rubin, an Orthodox Jewish hockey player who had been dropped by the Quebec Remparts because he had missed so many games because of the Jewish Sabbath. This season he is playing for the Gatineau Olympiques of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League.

After initially insisting he would not play on Friday nights and Saturdays, as he had not done in his rookie year in the league last year, 18-year-old Benjamin and his father, Michael Rubin, have decided to accede to his new team’s demand that he play full time, with the exception of major holidays. Rubin did not playing on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. If the team goes into the playoffs, it is also understood Rubin would not play on the first two days of Passover, which the team feels is a sacrifice at such a critical time.

He will continue to keep kosher (which for some road trips has meant taking his own food with him), will be allowed time for prayer and will be assisted by a non-Jew in keeping Shabbat rituals, his father said.

LLFHL Midget B Divisions

It's a shame that teams within 30 minutes of North York cannot be in the same division. As you can the problem with girls hockey is how spread out the team can be. So in order to include in the eastern and northern regions of the league, teams from Toronto are forced to do excessive travelling. The Mid-South division is the more fortunate group.

MIDGET B

East
Cold Creek
Durham West
Leaside
Lindsay
Northumberland
Oshawa
Scarborough
Whitby

Mid-South
Ancaster
Burlington
Flamborough
Guelph
Mississauga
North Halton
West Seneca

North-Central
Aurora
Barrie
Clearview
Etobicoke
North Simcoe
North York
Orangeville
Orillia
Vaughan

West
Belmont
Ilderton
Lambeth
Mt. Brydges
Norfolk
South Huron
Twin Centre

Welcome to Toronto, Vesa

After allowing an unremarkable (but certainly not embarrassing) three goals in his first exhibition game in the blue and white, new Toronto Maple Leaf goaltender Vesa Toskala awakened to these headlines Friday morning:

National Post - Toskala's Debut a Dud
Globe and Mail: Toskala's debut among the worst
Globe and Mail: Toskala shaky in Leafs debut
CBC - Toskala lets first shot through legs and loses 3-2 in his Leafs debut to Coyotes
Toronto Star - Tough start for Leafs' Toskala
Toronto Sun - Welcome to the jungle - Fans show no mercy for the new guy as Toskala hears boo birds in Leafs debut

Talk about being initiated by the hometown press.

Welcome to Toronto, Vesa.

Vaughan 3, Storm 0: Still a Good First Step

Last night's exhibition game against Vaughan was fast paced but lacked intensity which would explain why there were no penalties called. The visitors walked away with a 3-0 win despite some excellent scoring changes for the Storm in the 2nd half of the game. Still, it was a good first step in team building and indicates where the team needs work. With 12 new players this season, people will need some time to become familiar with each other. There are many players either new to rep hockey or the Midget level that will need to adjust to the speed of the game.

Lot of good things were on display on the ice last night: good team speed, very aggressive forechecking by Maryssa, Marley and Sheri, some signs of strong playmaking by Mari and Genevieve and plenty of enthusiasm.

1999 ACURA INTEGRA FOR SALE

...only rolled once.

Coyotes are on MySpace

Phoenix Coyotes Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer Michael Bucek announced today that the Coyotes have launched their very own MySpace page. The Coyotes Official MySpace page will allow fans to communicate directly with the club as well as with other Coyotes fans across the country.

You can see the site here, and it's a perfect fit for the attention deficit generation. I think I'm too old for this one.

Impact of the Rising Canadian Dollar on the NHL

In the January 2004 (the midpoint of the pre-lockout season), the Canadian dollar was worth about $0.78 U.S. today it's $0.97 which is a remarkable 24% increase. During that same period the NHL salary cap went from $39 million to $44 million and now up to $50.3 million which is a 29% rise. Since there are 6 Canadian teams the collect revenue in Canadian dollars, what impact does the dollar rise have on the salary cap? Probably lots.

It is a good assumption to make that the cap would not have risen to $50.3 million without the increased value of the Canadian dollar since league revenue is reported in U.S. dollars. So struggling U.S. based teams are having to pay higher player salaries to stay competitive without necessarily seeing an increase in revenue. It is likely that there is a fair amount of price elasticity when it comes to ticket sales so if teams increase ticket prices to meet the higher salary demands it will eventually impact on future sales. At some point in the future (when the Canadian dollar stops increasing or possibly falls) revenues could fall which will create a dilemma for players because it will require a drop in the salary cap. Teams with a lot of long-term contracts will be really be squeezed.

There is another possible impact which will likely appear this season. Canadian-based players have actually be taking a pay cut as the dollar rises. Since Darcy Tucker lives full time in Toronto but gets paid in U.S. dollars, his buying power has been falling. This will likely become more evident to players should the Canadian dollar rise above the American. The CBA prevents agents from negotiating contracts in Canadian dollars so will Canadian teams be a less desirable destination?

Not in use

Harold Ballard's Ghost Must Live at the ACC

The Toronto Maple Leafs have brought to an end their much discussed search for a mentor, seemingly without a satisfactory candidate to guide JFJ through the next NHL season.

At one point Scotty Bowman and John Muckler were both rumoured to be on the short list to offer sage advice to young Mr. Ferguson, as he tries to return the Maple Leafs to some form of respectability. However, in the end they never came to an agreement with the Leafs, nor did the short list of other candidates that the Leafs had cooked up.

The search apparently came to an end a couple of weeks ago, as Richard Peddie, president and CEO of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment closed the file and put the plan back in the filing cabinet.

A ridiculous situation where JFJ was trying to get his team set up for the upcoming season, and a t the same time his bosses seemed to be trying to undercut his managerial strength by suggesting that he might not be up to the job and required a mentor.

While Harold Ballard may be gone, somehow you sometimes get the feeling that his spirit came along when they moved from Maple Leaf Gardens to the Air Canada Centre.

Happy Birthday Genevieve

NHL's Morality Squad

Commissioner Gary Bettman has put the hammer down on Maple Leafs forward Mark Bell today, suspending the troubled forward for 15 regular season games (without pay) for his driving under the influence and hit and run incident in the fall of 2006.

This is an interesting development, especially considering Toronto GM John Ferguson was on sports radio all last week saying he didn't believe Bell would miss any time this season. I also can't recall if the NHL ever even dealt a suspension for off-ice conduct.

It would be incredibly naive to think there's not some connection between this move by the league and all of the off-ice discipline that's occurred in other major-league sports recently (eg., Michael Vicks, etc.), something that's been pointed to as a 'crack down' on the bad boys of sport.

I applaud the NHL for recognizing that off-ice conduct impacts on the league. But I see this developing into a real quagmire. What other types of conduct is deemed to be "dishonorable, prejudicial to or against the welfare of the League or the game of hockey"? How about Rick Tocchet who was involved in an illegal gambling ring? Dany Heatley accidentally killed a team mate because of excessive speeding - doesn't that deserve a suspension? The NHL can't be proud of the drunken brawl (and underage drinking) that the Stall brothers got into this summer? Bobby Hull was a wife beater, isn't that conduct that would be dishonourable to the league? How about cheating on your wife? Punching an annoying reporter? I could go on and on. The NHL has a hard enough time be fair and consistent in handing out suspensions for on-ice conduct. This is going to be a lot tougher.

Leaf Prediction

The following is posted on JFJ's blog.

"We are talking about going into a season where our expectations are making the playoffs and competing for the Cup. Clearly one has to precede the other, but we are not going to solely concentrate on qualifying. We want to consider making the playoffs something we pass along the way to accomplishing higher goals.

Last year was about making the playoffs. Our expectations, my expectations, are higher."

Going out on a limb aren't you Johnny? So adding Toskala, Bell and Blake make the Leafs a Cup contender. With the improvements made by Philadelphia and Florida, it will be a stretch to make the playoffs. But I will hold back any predictions until after training camp.

Canada Dominates Series

In case you weren't paying attention Canada whipped the Russians 7-0-1 in the 8-game series, completely dominating and outscoring the Russians 39-13.

Just a few things ...

1. Canada vs. Russia doesn't have any mystique to it, anymore. Sure, beating up the Russians always feels nice, but it's no longer special. The Iron Curtain is gone, we've played the Russians many times, and there wasn't anything all that different from this game from previous Canada/Russia affairs.

2. "We wanted it more!" - This cliché was actually pertinent as the Russians didn't appear all that interested in breaking a sweat. The Canadians? Sutter had them playing with gusto from the first puck drop, and they just seemed to be a lot more interested in paying the price to win.

3. The only time the Russians seemed to care was in the last game, when they started throwing a few 'sore loser' cheap shots. Canada made them pay with power play goals.

4. Canada and Russia have generally been looked at as the top 2 hockey powers in the world. Well, we know that is a-changing, with the Americans producing many more fine prospects, and the Russians churning out ... not much.

Can't We Play the Ticats Every Week?

Bishop completed 14 of 23 for 261 yards and threw two touchdown passes as the Toronto Argonauts swept their Labour Day series versus Hamilton with a 35-22 win Saturday.

Shcool

A street near Northwood Elementary in Kalamazoo, Michigan, has the word 'school' misspelled on the pavement.

Another Steeltown-Hogtown Showdown Today